I am male, 30, 242 lbs, 5'11". I have gained almost 50 lbs in the last year. a year ago I ran 2 sprint triathlons and was down to 201 for the first and 212 for the second.

So I am trying to get back on track. I would appreciate any feedback on my plan. Here it goes:

Diet: This is the hardest part for me. I know what to eat. Really I do, but I tend to go over in two main areas. First is beer. Much of my past year's wirght gain is due to beer. I'm not an alcoholic but I am in grad school and it is often high stress and one night a week of drinking is a good time for me to relax and kick back. The second is binge eating or pigging out. I like to feel full and often overeat at night for my dinner. My typical day's diet will look something like this:

B: oatmeal w/ skim milk (400 cals)
S: turkey breast 8oz
L: 450 cal or so sandwich with no dressing but perhaps a slice of cheese
S: homemade bar with oatmeal, walnuts, raisins (300 cals)

But then there is dinner-we'll take last ngiht's as an example:

D: 1 cup of broccoli, two baked chicken quarters with BBQ sauce (w/ skin), 200 cals of mashed potatoes with another 140 cals of butter.

As I said, I know that this dinner is horrible.

To be clear, I know-and have done- how to eat an extremely lean and healthy diet. My problem is that I never stick to it for more than a month. I really am trying to focus on a diet that I can stick to for life here. I need help finding a middle gorund between these extrme dinners and eating a dry chix breast and steamed veggies-because I know that I won't stick with the latter every night in the long term.

Weights (all exercises to failure and sets of 10,8,8:

M: bench and triceps pushdowns (dips once i lose more weight)
T: lat pulls, seated rows, bicep curls
W: mil press, upright rows, body weight squats (30-50)
R: same as Mon
F: same as T
S:same as W
S: off

Cardio:

I want to get back into tris again but not until I am under 200 lbs. So for now I am focusing on biking and running

M: Run 20 mins alternating between 10 min pace and 8:30 pace with occasioanl spring thrown in.
T: bike 20 mins
W: Run 30 mins at 10 min mile pace
R: bike intervals for 20 min
F: R 30 mins
S: ride 45 mins at medium pace
S: off

That's the plan I have been on for the last 2 weeks. I know the diet needs to be cleaned up. Really I do. I am workign on it. I haven't done crap for the last year or so and have been smoking as well. I am trying hard to quit that, but still falter a bit when drinking...